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Australia scores with plantation hardwood sales

On World Forestry Day, there are strong signs that Australia is emerging as a player in the global market for plantation wood.

Australian woodchip and log exports are rising, as demand for South American timber slumps.

Most of the demand is being met from Greater Green Triangle blue gum plantations in south western Victoria and near Mt Gambier in South Australia, but activity is also increasing in Tasmania.

"It's all plantation timber; bluegum and some pine," John Lamb says.

"It's a mix of woodchips and some logs going to Japan and to China, principally.

"That resource is reaching maturity, and it is phenomenally busy."

As chief executive of the Bonney Group's forestry division, John Lamb, is seeing more and more teams of workers deployed to harvest Victoria's plantation timber.

"It's amazing to see," John Lamb says.

"The port of Portland is a fantastic place.

"A woodchip ship will be loaded in a couple of days, and if you look out at sea, there'll be four queued up ready to go.

"At the same time on the other side of the port, there'll be an export ship being loaded with export logs, and it's just constant. "As soon as one moves out of the queue the next one moves in, and it's just great to see that level of activity."

The Tasmanian transport, logistics and energy business has seven trucks and a dozen staff working interstate harvesting plantations, and it plans to double or triple those numbers over the coming year.

John Lamb says the decline in the value of the Australian dollar is helping local exporters, at the same time that environmental and employment issues are affecting competitors in South America.

"South America, quite interestingly, has begun to see some environmental pressure and some industrial relations pressure.

"That's slowed the supply, particularly of woodchips out of South America, and the Asian buyers have begun to look elsewhere and they've come back to Australia, which is excellent."

In Tasmania, the majority of the hardwood plantations are on the market and Gunns liquidator, KordaMentha is calling for final bids by 31st March.

John Lamb says even though Gunns is in receivership, harvesting and export activity is starting to pick up.

"Our plantation resource in Tasmania is perhaps not quite ready to go, but not far away," John Lamb said.

"[Tasmania] had an industry sitting at a standstill for most of the last couple of years, and I think that needs to change.

"There's a lot of timber resource tied up in that process and everybody is waiting to see what happens.

"We've seen some of the sales of Gunns assets already doing really well.

"For example, Timberlink (part of the New Forest Group) purchased the Bell Bay sawmill and that facility has turned around.

"The people are really positive, the company is investing money and improving the productivity, and again we're active on that site, and part of that process.

"We're beginning to see signs of a turn around in Tasmania's forestry industry, and it's excellent.

"The next question for Tasmania is do you choose to make that sustainable or not.

"In Victoria and South Australia, fairly quickly after a coupe is logged they're back in there and replanting.

"If we want to make it sustainable in Tasmania we need to get to that point, and that's entirely possible.

"We have a great climate for growing trees and we still have the bones, the really strong bones, of a healthy forest industry.